Speakers
List of Speakers for 2025
Michelle Rayburn, Speaker & Writer
Michelle has spent over two decades finding hope in the trashy stuff of life, amusing and inspiring with a blend of humor and biblical teaching. She has authored nine books—including the Selah Awards finalist "Renewed: A 6-Week Personal or Small Group Bible Study" in the ReMade series and the Golden Scroll and Christian Market Awards winner "Classic Marriage: Staying in Love as Your Odometer Climbs."
As a freelance designer and indie publishing expert, she’s a whiz at combining her creativity with sharp editing skills to help authors bring their visions to life under their own publishing imprints. From copyediting to cover design and interior formatting, Michelle is a one-stop shop for indie authors. When not writing books, she’s delighting her readers through her weekly podcast and Substack blog Life Repurposed with Michelle Rayburn.
Dive into her world at www.michellerayburn.com
Follow her on Substack, https://substack.com/@michellerayburn?
Mary Portzen, Writer and Speaker
Mary Portzen graduated from the University of Northern Iowa with a BA in Psychology. She is a certified grief counselor trained under world-renown grief expert David Kessler and a Therapeutic Art coach. Mary has had over 700 pieces published under the name Mary Potter Kenyon. This includes hundreds of pieces published in newspapers, magazines, and anthologies, including essays in ten Chicken Soup books.
She is the author of seven non-fiction books, including the award-winning "Refined By Fire: A Journey of Grief and Grace," and "Called to Be Creative: A Guide to Reigniting Your Creativity." Her children's book on grief will be published by Familius Publishing in 2024. A member of the Advanced Writers and Speakers Association, she has been doing workshops and programs on expressive writing for healing, creativity, and writing for conferences, women's groups, libraries, and community colleges since 2011. Mary founded a grief retreat and Faith Writers conference in Dubuque.
Jolene Philo
Jolene Philo discovered Laura Ingalls Wilder in elementary school and Agatha Christie in high school and has been fascinated by prairie stories and cozy mysteries ever since.
Her West River Mystery Series combines her love of mysteries and northwest South Dakota’s short grass prairie where she and her husband Hiram lived for seven years after they married in 1977. Jolene is also the author of several non-fiction books about raising kids with disabilities. She and her husband now live in central Iowa with their daughter, son-in-law, and their two grandchildren. See Jane Dig!, the fourth book in her cozy mystery series features characters with disabilities, was released in October of 2024. You can keep up with her reading, writing, and life adventures at her website, www.jolenephilo.com.
Mackenzie Ryan Walters
Mackenzie Ryan Walters is the founder of StoryStruck Marketing, a boutique ghostwriting firm offering book outlining and ghostwriting services for business leaders.
With 20 years of professional writing and reporting experience, Mackenzie’s won national and regional journalism awards and is the author of Faith Storytellers: Unleash the Power of Your Story. She lives in West Des Moines, Iowa, with her husband, Andy, their two boys, and their dog, Maddie.
Website: faithstoryteller.org
Robyn Mulder
Writer, Editor, Blogger, Speaker
Robyn Mulder lives in Volga, SD. She is a freelance editor and writer. Her husband is a pastor and they have four children, one son-in-law, and three adorable grandchildren who recently moved to Delaware. Thank goodness for video calls!
Robyn published her first book this year: Staying Away from the Edge: Help and Hope for Living after a Mental Health Diagnosis.
She also writes at robynmulder.com and encourages others with her "Catch Your Thoughts with Robyn Mulder" podcast.
therobynsnest.org - Help for Angry Moms, and Happy Moms, Too!
Kim Harms
Kim Harms is the author of Life Reconstructed Navigating the World of Mastectomies and Breast Reconstruction, and the upcoming devotional Carried Through Cancer: 70 Days of Spiritual Strength from Cancer Fighters, Survivors and Caregivers (B&H 2025). She has a degree in English from Iowa State University and more than two decades of professional writing experience. She has written for a wide variety of places including devotionals, magazines and online resources.
Married to Corey for 26 years, the two have three sons and one English Springer Spaniel who thinks he’s the fourth child. A two-time breast cancer survivor, Kim offers support and resources for cancer fighters on her website kimharms.net. She can also be found on Instagram @kimharmsauthor and Facebook at KimHarmsAuthor.
Julie Sunne
Julie Sunne writes about finding real hope amid life’s real struggles. Her own struggles include enduring multiple miscarriages and caregiving an adult daughter who has significant intellectual disabilities. Julie has published two books, Sometimes I Forget: 60 Reminders of Hope for Your Hard Days (2024, B&H Publishing) and Everyday Praise: Walking in Greater Peace (2016), with another under contract.
Her writing has also been featured in HomeLife, Mature Living, and Celebrate Life magazines; print devotionals by Proverbs 31 Ministries and Guideposts; various online sites; and on her blog at https://www.juliesunne.com/. Julie enjoys the outdoors, homemade Chai tea lattes, dark chocolate, and playing board and card games.
She and her husband David are parents to three grown sons and a daughter who lives with them on an acreage in northeast Iowa.
Mary Humston
Author and speaker Mary Jedlicka Humston’s poetry and essays have been widely published locally and nationally. She has won numerous poetry awards. She’s had a poem published every year since 2005 in the Iowa Poetry Association’s Lyrical Iowa. Thirty poems were published in past years in the Iowa City Press-Citizen newspaper. Another poem was displayed on the 2014 Krakow Wall of Poetry in conjunction with the Krakow UNESCO City of Literature. Humston has presented dozens of workshops, readings, and speeches on such topics as letter writing, poetry, writing, chronic illness, prayer, and Little Free Libraries. She coauthored Mary & Me: A Lasting Link Through Ink with Mary Potter Kenyon.
Like her on her “Mary Jedlicka Humston” Facebook Author Page.